The effect of Forensic Accounting on Public Procurement: A new Perspective to Fraud Prevention in Ethiopia

As forensic accounting is the application of the laws of nature to the laws of man, this study was about asserting the applicability of forensic accounting on public procurement as a fraud prevention tool. It examined deterrence, government performance and attitude on the policy fairness in ten selected Ethiopian public Universities in the 2022. 109 questionnaires were administered to procurement officers of the selected universities with a simple random sampling. The collected data was analyzed via EVIEWS software package through a multiple linear regression analysis. The study revealed that forensic accounting couldn’t deter procurement fraud. Also, it discovered that the current government performance of exploiting forensic accounting is minimal. Ipso facto, the study recommends that governments from all level shall develop interest in forensic accounting & accountants for monitoring & investigation of suspected and confirmed fraud cases. The management of procurement authority shall better train accountants and auditors in; criminology, specifically oriented to the dynamics & scope of financial crimes, fraud prevention, ethical issues, investigation and remediation, alongside, giving prominent emphases to rationality, neutrality and independence of courts, if, forensic science is to be used as a driving engine of fraud prevention.